Why the Key to Success is Being in a Relationship

When we interviewed Craig Clemens, he told us a rather popular anecdote about how a conference of billionaires and unanimously decided that the one key to becoming a billionaire is in finding the right partner, as in a significant other. Bestselling author Robert Greene also explained to us that having the right significant other absolutely helps your work life. While most might believe growing a company and getting into a relationship don’t mix, our experience tells us otherwise- the best kind of success comes from reaching it with and through a significant other.

Here are five reasons why if you are looking for success in your company, you should probably find that special someone to be at your side now.

1. Being Alone Sucks

Just like how growing a company as a single founder is hard, working your way to success through any means is always tougher by yourself. It takes partners to really get things moving or a dedicated girlfriend, or boyfriend, to really give you that drive to keep going. This isn’t going to be your average relationship either. Both partners have to be tougher, more understanding, and patient with each other. This isn’t so much a relationship as it is a team, but when you both work together for a common goal, everything is possible.

2. You attract gold diggers and crappy people as you become more successful

While The Social Network depicts Mark Zuckerberg as an awkward Harvard student who built Facebook to get back at his ex-girlfriend, he’s actually been with his current wife Priscilla even before the idea for Facebook ever existed. Just knowing that there’s someone cheering for you and hoping that you succeed is enough to push most people into doing anything. Thinking forward, say you do become successful- very successful. Do you know how hard it is to find someone that appreciates how much work you put in to to be successful? Odds are they will appreciate you only for your success and money, and only someone that has been there from the beginning should really deserve that special place in your life and your heart.

3. You Won’t Find Support Like This Anywhere Else

No typical business partner can really see the sides of you that a girlfriend or boyfriend will see. No one will understand you more, know your strengths and weaknesses better, and love you for all of it. Only someone in that kind of position in your life can support you emotionally and physically, and in the stressful, often lonely, and long days of working as a bootstrapped entrepreneur, nothing could mean more than having someone there to understand, watch your back, and take care of you when you are too busy pouring your soul into your company. As the saying goes, “Behind every successful man, is a great woman” and vice versa.

4. Two Brains are Better Than One

Dish Network founder Charles Ergen currently ranks #62 on the Forbes list with a net worth of $15.6 Billion. While people know how successful he is, most might not know that he actually started the business with his future wife Cantey. The couple and another partner managed to build the company from the ground up to what Dish Network is today. Now that’s what I call a power couple!

It’s like having another brain, one that thinks like you do and wants the same things. Your girlfriend or boyfriend may become your unofficial business partner, assuming you find the right person of course. Having someone that close to you like that brings benefits you won’t find anywhere else, as Robert Greene explains:

“To have a person there that you love grounds you, you have a routine, and you can feed your ideas off of them…I never thought of it that way but if you look at a lot of really successful people, you’ll find that by the time they get into their 30’s and 40’s they realize that it took me till I was in my late 30’s to realize that you need something like that, otherwise you’ll be too scattered and crazy and you’ll be out there in the dating world and never getting to your work.”

5. Only They Can Push You to Your Full Potential

And that’s the most important point. However hard we think we can work for ourselves, you are never quite driven the way you are for someone you deeply love and respect. Making a company successful for them means more to us than doing it for ourselves. We listen to them, we trust them, they tell us what we should be doing, and we do it. Taking a note from House of Cards’ power couple Frank and Claire Underwood, Frank is only as dangerous and ambitious as he is because of how much Claire pushes him to be for the benefit of their relationship. If you want to go all the way, you need to find your Claire or Frank in life.

6. You’re not spending valuable time out trying to get laid

Let’s face it, both men and women have sexual needs (ok fine, maybe just mainly men). Unless you decide to become celibate until you’re successful or incredibly religious, everyone needs to get laid. Having a significant other takes your mind away from wasting time going out at night and lets you focus on what’s truly important.